
M.Sc. (Hons) Microbiology, Panjab University, India
B.Sc. (Hons) Microbiology, Panjab University, India
Research Interests
Research:
I am interested in how we attend to the world around us! What we attend to is determined by the content - and context - of the information we receive. Unexpected events in our environment attract our attention even when we are completely focused on something else. This ability to shift our focus to new events is called orienting, and is enabled by our ability to ignore, or habituate to, everything that we have already experienced. For example, when we move to a new room, we wonder if we can ever sleep, but a week later, the strange noises and creaks are forgotten.
Overt orienting - moving our head and eyes to the source of a sudden sound - is accompanied by changes in heart rate, skin conductance, EEG activity, and pupil size. first discovered the novelty-induced pupil dilation response (PDR) in the barn owl, and have used it to track orienting and habituation. The PDR allows us to probe our ability to detect and discriminate between sound stimuli, allowing use to study the barn owl's spatial hearing, and the human ability to detect quiet sounds.
- Popular Press articles
- Podcasts:
- Spotlight on science: Barn owl with Dr. Avinash Singh
- Building champions: Episode 2 - Fighting the drift